Battery Tester - recommendations please

[cpedw]

That was one problem. Worse I think is using voltage under load to indicate state of charge. Should have loaded for a time, then rested (probably for several hours) before measuring voltage to infer remaining charge.

IMO the reason why there's lots of devices and much discussion about measuring battery capacity is because nobody fully understands it, or if they do it's very complicated.

I've just had my attention drawn to the TI bq34z110 chip. I don't understand the data sheet but I think it claims to do everything we all want to do. I'd be interested to hear if anyone can get their head around it.

 

[nigelmercier]

I've just had my attention drawn to the TI bq34z110 chip...

Free samples ordered: http://www.ti.com/product/bq34z110?DCMP=hpa-pmp-bq34z110-en&HQS=bq34z110-pr

 

[ghostlymoron]

I don't know anything about chips (except the greasy kind) but, if there is a chip available to perform the function of a battery tester, isn't there likely to be a complete device incorporating the chip that does what is required. Or isn't this how chip development works?

 

[nigelmercier]

I don't know anything about chips (except the greasy kind) but, if there is a chip available to perform the function of a battery tester, isn't there likely to be a complete device incorporating the chip that does what is required...

There is, although this one is not man enough:

http://www.actmeters.com/battery-testing/gold-plus-6v-12v-battery-tester

 

[ghostlymoron]

I've heard that 110ah batteries are actually less than 100ah so that tester would would do the job although, at that price, I won't be getting one.

 

[Plevier]

I wouldn't regard the TI device as a battery tester.
It is as they say a fuel gauge, that will estimate the remaining available capacity of a healthy battery during a discharge, widely used on fork lift trucks etc.
Curtis Instruments (and others no doubt but i think Curtis are the leaders) have made complete instruments like this for a long time, see http://curtisinstruments.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=cDataSheets.dspListDS&CatID=73&siteID=1&langid=1, I don't know whether based on the TI chip or an earlier version of it.
It's more akin to a SmartGauge monitor than a tester.